-> I have read and read till my eyes hurt and still do not understand
-> this trunked system and what it is good or bad for.....could someone
-> explain in plain laymans terms about it?
With a 'conventional' system, an agency that is inactive much of the
time (school buses, tac channels for PD, etc) are considered
'under-used' since no one else has access to them during the slow times.
The selling point for a trunked system is that you'll have more channels
to work with, OFTEN with the number of talkgroups used in place of the
actual number of frequencies.
What the designers seem to forget is that ALL the 'active' users us AT
THE SAME TIME!  During the daytime, especially morning and evening rush,
you have far more dispatches and activity for things like traffic
accidents, school buses, street repairs and the like.  At 3am, there is
VERY little going on.  And in many cases, like here in San Diego, the
City ends up with FAR fewer total frequencies than before.  Previously,
the Fire Department has 12 freqs, PD had 12, and that's NOT counting
inputs.  Now, the TOTAL is 17 freqs, with one always the data channel
and one the 'overflow' and phone patch channel, leaving only 15 channels
for PD, Fire, buses, lifeguards, City Shops (ALL of them from streets to
communications), and more.
The idea in a trunked system is that a radio doesn't 'use' a frequency
or channel until it is keyed up.  At that time, the radio sends a
'request' on the data channel, and the controller assigns it one of the
open frequencies to talk on, and at the SAME time, all other radios
that are set to the same talkgroup as 'sent' to the same frequency.
When the radio is un-keyed, the frequency assignment is over and the
radios go back to monitoring the data channel until another radio on
that talkgroup is keyed up.
With an ordinary scanner, you can't 'lock onto' a talkgroup, you have to
just scan ALL the frequencies and hope you hear what you're interested
in.  On a small system (about 4-8 freqs) it's not TOO hard to do.  OPn a
system with 10 or more freqs (the max for a single zone on a Motorola
system is 28 freqs) it can be almost impossible to follow a
conversation.
THAT is where the Uniden TrunkTracker radios come into play.  They can
be programmed by you for a trunked system, and then you can ALSO program
in talkgroups and follow a conversation just as if it were on an old
dedicated frequency.
--- Platinum Xpress/386/Wildcat! v1.3d
-> Yea I got the 98 edition...same freqs....but nutin on em.....
My reply to your reply and your reply to my reply must have crossed in the 
mail. I've sent you new info that in part disagrees with PC. You'll see.
--- InterEcho 1.18
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